2 posts from October 18, 2013

October 18, 2013

The football team's on a bye weekend. So, perhaps the focus should turn to the most consistently successful team of the last few years, women's soccer.

At 3-2 in Conference USA (5-8 overall, though the C-USA website says 7-6), FIU leads the conference's East Division going into the Alumnae Weekend games with East Carolina (4-8-2, 1-4) tonight and Rice (5-5-2, 3-2) Sunday. The most recent of junior Ashleigh Shim's team-high six goals came in overtime of a 3-2 win against UAB last Sunday, the second consecutive 3-2 overtime win by FIU. Junior Johanna Volz got the game-winner against Louisiana Tech the week before.

FIU has pumped in 10 goals in their five conference games, ranking third in offense for intraconference play.

These will be the Panthers' last home games before the home and season finale Oct. 31 vs. Marshall (7-4-2, 2-2-1). They'd need to run the table, the home games plus games at FAU and Middle Tennessee State, for another 10-win season. But with the injuries they've had -- leading scorers Chelsea Leiva, Scarlett Montoya, top backliner Nikki Rios -- anything near or at .500 going into the Conference USA tournament would count as a valiant effort.